Re: [tied] Goths: IE Languages vs Germanic

"Piotr Gasiorowski" <gpiotr@...> replied:
<<In fact, the Goths (Ostrogoths as well as Visigoths) are mentioned
quite often in OE sources (e.g. in Widsith and Deor), always as Gota
(N.sg.), Gotan (N.pl.), Gotena (Gen.pl.), Gotum (Dat.pl.) -- forms
that unequivocally point out to a weak Germanic stem (*guto:n-)...
<gota> < *gut-o:n- is a well-formed Germanic agent noun>>

I understand. Again, I'm not trying to prove or disprove anything.
Just suggesting what I think are some grounds for reasonable doubt.
This is obviously some good evidence for the prevalent Goth theories.
But when we reverse some assumptions, alternative explanations become
at least possible if not probable.

<<Latin influence is not likely, since in the Latin prototypes, where
these can be identified,Êthe form is <Gothi> rather than
<Got(h)ones>.>>

Not if the sources are Pliny, Tacitus or Ptolemy - none mentions
Gothi. We know Tacitus had some big fans among Germanic rulers and
therefore their scribes. You mention Widsith. He claims to have sung
before Casear, Alexander and in Egypt -- these are Classical
allusions. Let me even suggest that word of Eormari:c -- hundreds of
years later and a whole continent distant -- also may have filtered
through Latin and perhaps Arianist Greek intermediaries. Could
have OE speakers imported "gothones" and because of -ones treated it
as a native word?

<<It's clear that theÊAnglo-Saxon scribes used their own
traditionalÊterm ...>>

But early AS scribes would have been, first of all, Latin scribes.
And, even if <gotan>/<*gut-o:n> is native AS, that does NOT make
it native Goth. The Greeks and Romans either abandoned or
distinguished the westerly <gothones> form AFTER direct contacts with
historical Goths, located to their east. Literate Anglo-Saxons
centuries later were not part of that first-hand experience. Making
"pan-Germanic" assumptions about the Goth name may be what's
doubtable here. Steve